Vigil Strange I Kept on the Field One Night

Whitman’s dramatic monologue opens with inverted syntax: “Vigil strange I kept on the field one night” (Line 1). This inversion of the traditional sentence structure—which might read, “I kept a strange vigil on the field one night”—unsettles readers and makes them feel the disorientation of battle, especially during the American Civil War. Similarly, the speaker blends his relationship with his fallen friend in Line 2, calling him “my son and my comrade.” Most contemporary scholars agree that the use of the word son is designed to show the bond between the two men—not to indicate an actual familial relationship.

The men share one last look, “which your dear eyes return’d with a look I shall never forget, / One touch of your hand to mine O boy, reach’d up as you lay on the ground” (Lines 3-4). While avoiding mawkish sentiment, these lines are indicative of the tenderness between the men in their final moment together. The war must go on, however, and the speaker “sped in the battle, the even-contest battle” (Line 5), which introduces one of the poem’s most noteworthy conventions: repetition. The word vigil is repeated 12 times in the poem, and many other words and phrases also recur, as the word “battle” does in Line 5.